A few weeks ago, some kids in my life asked me if I ever played Fortnite and if I would play sometime. I had heard of the game and knew that it was incredibly popular, but beyond that, I knew nothing about it. They told me it was a cooperative shooter where we would compete on a team against other teams and battle it out to the end.
Before my first match with them, I thought I should practice to get a sense of how the game worked. I haven’t played many online multiplayer games. I prefer more detailed single player stories and the online games I have played — primarily first person shooters — usually are too difficult for me. Going back to LAN matches of Quake, I have a long history of getting killed quickly and waiting for the next match to start so that the same thing can happen all over again.
I downloaded Fortnite (relieved that I didn’t need to buy a PlayStation Plus membership to play) and booted it up. Almost immediately, the game was what people would describe as “a lot”. Loud music, a bunch of characters I don’t recognize (one of whom is a pickle and another a hot dog), but also what I seem to remember as Sub-Zero from Mortal Kombat. If the title screen was overwhelming, the assortment of characters running around my screen was even more confusing. I eventually learned that the first place I was dropped isn’t actually a battleground and that no weapons carry over into the main match.
I slowly got the hang of it and stopped being killed within the first few minutes. Still, there were so many things to understand. You can ride vehicles, you can “emote” (dance? I still haven’t figured that one out), there is a storm that you have to avoid (and for some reason, going in a building doesn’t prevent damage), and random pop culture characters and even real people (why is Snoop Dogg here?) abound. To me, the combat felt a bit easier than Call of Duty and the bigger area allowed me some time to familiarize myself the controls.
I’ve played a few times now on teams and I’m no longer embarrassing myself completely in each round. It’s slow going, but every once in a while, I feel like I might contribute something to the team I am playing on. Most surprisingly, I have actually taken to playing the occasional solo round. I haven’t won, but I have actually managed to get to #2 a few times. I’m leveling up — although I’m unsure to what end — and I even have unlocked a few cosmetic items. After a few weeks, I still feel like there are whole swathes of the game that I don’t understand. Some of the mechanics (building) and especially the “culture” of the game are baffling, but it’s more fun that I was expecting. I’m unsure how long I’ll keep playing, but I’m starting to understand why people get hooked on these “forever games”.
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